Former Drydenite Stephanie Woodworth recently co-authoured a children’s book that invites readers to explore Canada’s waterways from a fresh perspective. Photos submitted

By Michael Christianson

The group from Waterlution is asking Canadians to think about their relationship with water and how issues such as access and pollution affect us all.

Former Drydenite Stephanie Woodworth took the First Place in the 2017-17 Great Water Challenge and sits on the 2017-2018 youth advisory board for the GWC.

“I came to Dryden and I hosted two workshops with schools at Open Roads and St. Joseph’s School and there will be two water celebrations hosted in Dryden before World Water Day which is on March 22,” said Woodworth.

Woodworth also co-authored a new book with other youth advisory members called Canada’s Great Water Adventure.

The book invites readers to explore Canada and its waterways through the eyes of Fernando – an exchange student from Brazil, and Brooke – a young Canadian, whose family is hosting Fernando. These two young adventurers set out to visit each province and territory from coast to coast to coast across Canada, to learn about many breathtaking and unique waterways.

“There’s so much to learn about water in our community and that our community is built on and around and within water and we have to start thinking about how we can connect better to our water bodies and think about the water related issues within our community but also with other communities around our area,” said Woodworth. “I know that one of the schools in particular was really looking at the mercury contamination at Grassy Narrows as well as other first nations communities and how the Dryden Paper Mill is responsible for that contamination and what we can do as a town to increase the awareness of the decades of suffering that these communities had to endure because of the paper mill and how we can build relationships with those communities.”

Woodworth says some of these issues are large but the key is to not get overwhelmed and to think about what we can do to bring positive change in small steps.

Share

Related Articles

About Author

Chris Marchand is a native of Dryden, Ontario. He served his first newspaper internship at The Dryden Observer in 1998 while attending journalism studies at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops B.C.
He's worked desks as both reporter and editor at the Fernie Free Press as well as filled the role of sports editor at the Cranbrook Daily Townsman.
Marchand was named editor of the Dryden Observer in Aug. 2009.